At the End of “Jupiter Ascending,” Why Does Jupiter Go Back to Cleaning Toilets?
Jupiter Ascending (2015) begins with Jupiter (Mila Kunis) working as a maid. She hates her job, spends her days cleaning toilets, and falls asleep at night repeating the mantra “I hate my life.” Her family is so poor she almost goes through with selling her eggs to earn money. But Jupiter goes through an incredible journey during the film and effectively becomes the “owner” of the entire planet Earth, and yet returns to cleaning toilets and carrying on with her old way of life after the ordeal is over.
Why?
On a perfunctory level, Jupiter doesn’t end the film with any greater financial means than she started. She’s an Abrasax and owns the Earth, sure - but unless she decides to harvest the Earth’s population and contribute to the Abrasax family business, there’s no indication she has gained any usable wealth from her position. The story leaves a lot of holes open (Does her authority give her ownership of other planets? Does she not care about the fates of the citizens of the other planets? Does simply being royalty entitle her to any other riches?) but they go unanswered.
On a more philosophical side, she returns to cleaning toilets because she no longer hates her existence. She began the film hating her life because she felt useless and like she had no options in life. During the film, she gains an appreciation for the common, everyday life she’s been given. She starts to understand how much her family means to her, how important life itself is, and how it should be appreciated regardless of how much superficial value it holds. She was given the power to decide the fate of the entire Earth, but she decided to return to her pedestrian existence. There is no longer shame in being a made because it’s what she chose to do, not what she has to do. Whether or not Jupiter continues that lifestyle forever is debatable, but she returned to use her experiences to make peace with her former purpose.
Plus, she’s apparently still able to zoom around Chicago on gravity boots with Caine (Channing Tatum), so it’s not as if she didn’t inject her old life with a few intergalactic perks.